It's an interesting country to be sure. And it's odd you ask this since I'm writing this from a cafe in Auckland.
My gut feeling is that a significant part of the economy is heavily influenced by government policy, but the most important one has a decent level of autonomy. I speak, of course, of food production.
In a sense, the relative freedom of this country, I think, is due to the relative peace they've had over the years. No one is trying to invade it, for example.
I didn't really think much of New Zealand until covid , then I started to realise how authoritarian it was .
But then I started noticing it everywhere, so I don't know .
So great to get a reply from an idol! Sorry my cyber feelers are out I used to live there. It’s definlitly peaceful there. I reccomend getting out in the forest.
I think porperty rights are still fairly strong. Government overreach is significant, but limited becuase people can actually almost fathom how the government operates and the total of its statue (not really possible in USA or AUS). The legal industry is held back this way and through the ACC system, turns out lawyers don’t takover so much if you don’t feed them petty injury cases.
